The formal time of worship begins with a Call to Worship from Scripture. This means that God Himself, through His Word, calls His people to draw near and worship Him. We do not enter God’s presence on our own terms. Like entering the throne room of a king, we come because He summons us, welcomes us, and receives us through Jesus Christ.

This is why the Call to Worship often includes the congregation speaking together. God calls us as His people, and we respond together as His church. Public worship is not merely a private moment between the individual and God. It is the gathered body of Christ coming before the Lord together. That is also why we often speak prayers, confessions, and scriptural responses together, such as when the pastor says, “Lift up your hearts,” and the congregation responds, “We lift them up to the Lord.”

As we worship, we are reminded that we are not simply sitting in a building on Sunday morning. When we worship with God’s people in Christ Jesus, we are spiritually brought before the throne of heaven and united with the worship that continues eternally there. This does not mean our bodies leave the room or that we are pretending to be somewhere else. It means that by the Holy Spirit, through faith, and because we are united to Christ, we truly draw near to God in worship. In public worship, we are called out of the world and into the presence of God. We gather with God’s people in a building on Sunday, and yet we are united with the saints throughout history and throughout the world. Though you cannot see them, there are angels in the architecture.

When God calls His people to worship, the right response is adoration. In Isaiah 6, when the prophet is given a vision of the Lord’s throne room, he hears the seraphim crying out, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of His glory.” To see the glory of God is to be moved to worship.

That is why, after the Call to Worship, we respond by singing a song of adoration or praise. Scripture commands God’s people to sing, and it assumes that we will. Music is a fitting response to the Lord because it joins truth, beauty, affection, and praise together. When we sing, we are not merely filling time in the service. We are answering God’s call with worship.

So come ready to sing. Bring melody in your heart and music in your lungs. You do not need to be a trained singer, and you may not know every song right away. But give yourself to it. Listen, learn, and join your voice with the church. Fathers, sing loudly and gladly, and your family will learn to follow. God commands us to sing, and in His kindness He commands us to do what His glory should move us to do: praise Him with joy.

In Isaiah 6, after the prophet sees the Lord in His glory, he immediately recognizes his own sin and unworthiness. That is what happens when men draw near to God. His greatness, majesty, and holiness make us aware of our smallness, sinfulness, and need for mercy.

After we sing praise to God, we hear from His law. Each week, we read a portion of God’s Word that shows us His holy standard and calls us to repentance. Often this reading comes from Proverbs, which in many ways applies and unfolds the wisdom of God’s commandments for everyday life.

The law of God is good. It teaches us what righteousness is, exposes our sin, and shows us our need for Jesus Christ. Therefore, after hearing God’s law, we kneel together and pray a prayer of repentance, asking the Lord to forgive us and cleanse us through Christ.

This is not meant to leave God’s people in despair. It is meant to teach us to come honestly before the Lord, confessing our sins and trusting His mercy.

Immediately after the prayer of repentance comes one of the sweetest moments in our worship: the assurance of God’s pardon.

After we confess our sins, we are reminded from Scripture that our God is merciful. For all who repent and believe in Jesus Christ, God has forgiven our sins by the blood of His Son and made us clean. The elder reads a passage of Scripture that declares the promises of the gospel and reassures us that forgiveness is found in Christ.

He then announces the truth of God’s pardon in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. The triune God has worked for our salvation. The Father sent the Son, the Son obeyed the Father and gave Himself for sinners, and the Holy Ghost applies the work of Christ to our lives.

Because of this good news, we respond with joy. That is why we sing again. Forgiven sinners should be a singing people.

After God calls us to worship, convicts us of sin, and assures us of His pardon in Christ, the church responds by professing our faith in His promises together.

Each week, we publicly confess that Jesus is Lord, believing in our hearts that God raised Him from the dead. We usually do this by reciting the Apostles’ Creed or the Nicene Creed, historic summaries of the Christian faith confessed by the Church throughout the ages.

The creeds do not replace Scripture. They help us summarize and confess what Scripture teaches. When we confess the faith together, we are speaking God’s truth to one another, standing in unity with faithful Christians throughout history, and declaring before the world that we belong to Jesus Christ.

The Lord Jesus said that His house is to be a house of prayer. In one sense, the entire service is an act of communion with God, and this is why prayer is woven throughout our worship.

When we hear Scripture, we respond with thanksgiving: “This is the Word of the Lord.” “Thanks be to God.” When we confess our sins, we pray for mercy. When we receive God’s pardon, we praise Him. When we bring our needs before Him, we ask for His help. Worship is time with God, and prayer is one of the chief ways we speak to Him.

The apostles also teach us to pray for all men, including kings and all who are in authority. Because the Church is a royal priesthood, we come before God not only for ourselves, but also on behalf of others. Each week at Sovereign King Church, we intentionally pray for churches and their pastors, those serving in various ministries, our civil rulers, and the needs of the world around us.

We also pray the Lord’s Prayer together, following the model prayer Jesus gave His disciples. This teaches us to seek first the glory of God, the coming of His kingdom, daily dependence upon Him, forgiveness of sins, deliverance from evil, and lives ordered according to His will.

The Apostle Paul spoke of the first day of the week as a day when Christians gathered resources for the work of ministry. From the beginning, God’s people have honored the Lord with their substance, supporting the work of worship, mercy, and the proclamation of the gospel.

At Sovereign King Church, we believe giving is an act of worship. We worship the Lord with our hearts, our minds, and our strength. In Deuteronomy 6, the word translated “strength” includes the idea of our resources and possessions. We come before the Lord bringing all that we are, and that includes our finances.

The Lord loves a cheerful giver. We give because everything we have comes from Him. It is all His to begin with, for He is the One from whom all blessings flow. He deserves all of us.

You can give online or place your tithes and offerings in the offering box at the back of the church.

And because God is the giver of every good gift, we sing the Doxology together, praising the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost from whom all blessings flow.

The proclamation of the Word is central to Christian worship. When the Scriptures are faithfully read and preached, God speaks to His people through His Word.

God has determined to use the preaching of His Word to convict sinners, stir up faith in His children, expose lies, correct error, comfort the afflicted, and teach us how to live before Him. He ordains men to proclaim His message, and though this may seem foolish to the world, it is the wisdom and power of God.

For that reason, we give ourselves to the hearing of the Word. We listen attentively, receive it with faith, examine our lives by it, and seek to obey what God has spoken. We do not come merely to hear a man’s opinions. We come to hear the Word of the living God.

Week after week, the preaching of Scripture shapes our hearts, renews our minds, strengthens our faith, and points us to Jesus Christ. Public worship centers on the Word because God is pleased to gather, feed, correct, and build His people through His Word.

After we hear the Word proclaimed with our ears, the Lord also gives us visible signs of His promises. These signs are called sacraments. A sacrament is a holy sign and seal appointed by Christ to show us the promises of the gospel and strengthen our faith.

The two sacraments instituted by Jesus are baptism and the Lord’s Supper.

Baptism is a one-time sacrament given to believers and their children as a sign of God’s covenant and initiation into the visible church. It is a visible picture of the promises of the gospel: that God will be our God, that through Jesus Christ He washes away sin, and that He gives new life by His Spirit. Baptisms do not happen every week, but when someone is baptized, all who have been baptized are reminded again of the promises God has shown to them.

The Lord’s Supper is celebrated every week. In the Supper, we see, touch, and taste a visible proclamation of the gospel. The bread and wine remind us that Christ’s body was given for us and His blood was shed for the forgiveness of sins. The Supper points us back to the cross and forward to the day when we will see Christ face to face and feast with Him in glory.

When received by faith, the Lord’s Supper is not an empty ritual. Christ is truly present with His people by His Spirit, and He strengthens us as we eat and drink together with His Church. In this way, the Lord’s Supper is a visible and physical proclamation of the Word about Jesus.

Because the Supper is holy, Scripture also warns us not to receive it carelessly or in unbelief. Those who receive it in faith enjoy its benefits, while those who come in hypocrisy, unrepentant sin, or division are warned of God’s judgment. For this reason, we invite baptized Christians who have made a credible profession of faith, are members of a Bible-believing church in good standing, and are not living in unrepentant sin to partake.

After God has called us to worship, convicted us of sin, assured us of His grace, received our confession of faith, taught us from His Word, fed us at His Table, and blessed us with fellowship in Christ, He sends us back into the world to live as His people.

God calls us to Himself so that He may send us out in faith and obedience. We are not meant to leave worship unchanged or disconnected from the rest of life. We go back to our homes, work, callings, families, neighbors, and communities as servants of Jesus Christ.

That is why we end worship with a final song and a benediction. A benediction is a blessing from God’s Word. We leave with the praise of God on our tongues and the blessing of God upon us, sent out to confess Christ as King, proclaim His gospel reign, and construct our lives according to His command.

This is the mission of Sovereign King Church: we confess Christ as King, proclaim Christ’s gospel reign, and construct according to Christ’s command.

We want our worship to be biblical, reverent, joyful, and full of faith. Our desire is to worship God according to His Word, to receive the good gifts He has given to His Church, and to stand in unity with the faithful saints who have gone before us.

At the same time, we do not want to go through the motions with hearts far from God. We do not gather merely to follow a tradition or repeat a familiar order. We gather to meet with the living God through Jesus Christ. We want to worship Him with our hearts, souls, minds, and strength, entering His gates with thanksgiving and His courts with praise.

As you learn the flow of our worship, we encourage you to participate with understanding and joy. Talk about these things with your children on the way to and from church. Help them understand why we do what we do. Teach them that worship is not a performance to watch, but the joyful duty and privilege of God’s people.

May the Lord use our worship to strengthen our faith, shape our homes, build His Church, and send us out to confess Christ as King, proclaim His gospel reign, and construct according to His command.